France

I had my first jab on Wednesday, at a vaccination centre in the south of Paris, run by the fire service. The fireman who administered my vaccine shared my love of rugby and once the ice had broken I asked him what life was like as a firefighter (I've heard some terrible stories, of fire crews attacked as they worked). His district was relatively calm, he told me, unlike those of some of his colleagues. It's far worse, he added, for the police, many of whom at that moment were gathering in Paris at a rally attended by several politicians, including Gérald Darmanin, the Interior Minister. Ostensibly it was to remember two of their colleagues who were murdered in recent weeks in separate incidents, one by an Islamist and the other by an alleged drug dealer.

In October last year Emmanuel Macron had a long list of around 300 to 500 names drawn up. These were no ordinary figures but rather a number of renowned French immigrants who were being lined up as candidates for new street names and statues. Among their number was Martinican philosopher and activist Frantz Fanon, Moroccan war veteran Hammou Moussik, and the Egyptian French singer Dalida. And yet the man behind the scheme, Pascal Blanchard, is arguably more interesting than any of the names on the list.

‘What is grave about this situation, Messieurs, is that it is not serious’, was how General de Gaulle addressed his cabinet following the attempted putsch des généraux in April 1961. That could equally apply to recent Franco-British ructions over fishing rights in the Channel Islands. It is mere gesture politics, for all the French retaliatory threats to cut off the electricity supply to Jersey, the British dispatch of two Royal Navy vessels and the French countering with two patrol boats. Behind the facade France and Britain are serious military and diplomatic allies bound by important and wide-ranging security treaties that go beyond just Nato.

Emmanuel Macron was in Strasbourg on Sunday where he addressed the Conference on the Future of Europe. This is where the President of France is happiest, describing the utopia that he still believes can be achieved by the EU. He feels important and powerful and he is among like-minded people, such as David Sassoli, president of the European parliament, who declared: ‘This conference is for ordinary citizens. Europe is not just for the elites, nor does it belong to them.’ There's a touch of the Tony Blair in Macron's canine devotion to the EU, and it wouldn't be a surprise if the President accomplishes what eluded the former British prime minister and one day becomes the President of Europe. It would certainly be an easier life than running France.

The stand-off between France and Britain has escalated into something altogether more serious. Yesterday, the French maritime minister called for Jersey’s electricity supply to be cut off in response to a dispute over fishing rights. Egged on by French officials, around 80 boats began blockading the port of St Helier this morning in a move that is reminiscent of Ursula von der Leyen’s aborted plans for a hard Irish border to stop the flow of vaccines into the UK. Now there are scenes of British Navy vessels approaching the fishing boats as French ships chart a course for the Channel island. Some on the Continent are claiming that the stand-off has been manufactured by Boris Johnson to deflect from his various scandals ahead of today’s elections.

A political storm has swept France in recent days. It follows the publication of an open letter by twenty retired generals to Emmanuel Macron. In their declaration, originally published on an obscure website and then reproduced in conservative magazine, Valeurs Actuelles, the officers warned that Islamist terrorism was pushing France towards civil war. The reaction among the political class was predictable. Marine Le Pen invited the signatories (1,000 in total) to join her National Rally party, while the government condemned the letter as 'irresponsible'. It promised action if any serving soldiers or gendarmes have put their name to to it. Some on the left want a criminal investigation launched, accusing those behind the letter of 'provocation and disobedience'.

Another day, another Islamist murder in France — this time, a 49-year-old policewoman fatally stabbed in the neck by a Tunisian man screaming 'Allahu Akbar.' She was murdered in her own station, in Rambouillet, 25 miles south of Magnanville, where in 2016 an Islamist stabbed a husband and wife police couple to death in front of their three-year-old child. In the intervening years there have been numerous police officers killed by men of a similar ideology, to the point now where the brutal slaying of a female officer slips down the news pecking order after just one day. Such is the acceptance in France of Islamist terrorism. C'est la vie. What’s striking, now, is the lack of outrage. The murder did not even lead the French television news.

Many years ago I married into a family of the French working-class. They came from Aveyron, La France Profonde, and most were dyed-in-the-wool socialists. But at a barbecue in the summer of 2002 one, Fabien, admitted that he had cast his ballot for Jean-Marie Le Pen in the recent election. A quarrel ensued but the young man stood his ground. His car had been broken into three times in a matter of months and the police in Marseille had shown no interest. Voting for Le Pen was Fabien's protest at the police indifference to petty crime. Twenty years later and it is no longer unusual to discover young people who vote for Le Pen’s daughter, Marine.

Britain's favourite Frenchman, Michel Barnier, is in the Calais region today where he will address a conference about his part in Brexit and perhaps give a further indication as to his presidential aspirations. The EU's chief Brexit negotiator was described in yesterday's Le Figaro as the man who can 'unite the right' and in doing so present a credible alternative to Emmanuel Macron and Marine Le Pen in 2022. Barnier presides over a political initiative called Patriotes et européens and he explained its concept to Le Figaro: 'Patriot and European, this means that I believe in the force of the nations, the respect of national identities and France as a country of influence at the head of the European nations.